Idiosyncrasy, This won't end well. Options

[Petra Arkanian]

Okay, so I've been unactive for a while (yeah, yeah, underestimated, more like 3 months, which is a long time), and most of the reason why is because I've been trying and trying to come up with good ideas for my other story (Concerned but powerless), and sadly, I have - for the moment - failed. Utterly and completely. I have realized that I was playing the same old card like fifty times, and... yeaaaaaaah. Anyway. Rambling. So, basically, long story short, I have decided to start a new story and yeah I can see where this is going because it's such a common trend with me, as I have a ton of books that I've started and never finished. Yep. Okay, now for the story.

CHAPTER 1

Run, run, run. Toward the deer, away from the deer, just run.

I vault over a large fallen tree, knock an arrow, and try to aim at the buck while sprinting. My arrow sprouts out of it's neck, and I slow my pace to a walk as I go to fetch my kill. The arrow is snapped in two, which I expected, since the buck had fallen on his left side, which is where the arrow was. I shove the deer over onto its back, with its legs lolling out aimlessly, and I try to dig the shaft out of the smooth, tan hide. A young buck - that's good. I haven't had meat for a while, since the Blackwood is relatively devoid of animals, but flourishing with plants. And let me tell you, living off plants is no party. I once knew a few people (they're dead now) who'd live of anything besides meat. And I'll never understand why.

As I gather wood for a fire, I begin to contemplate where I'll go next. I've always wondered what it's like in Bruma, but really, I don't really fancy the cold, and in any case, I'm not much of a people person. I like dead people okay, but live ones? Definitely not. They talk too much. It's the same with pretty much every kind of humanoid. Self-centered and unrealistic. So I stay away from them as much as possible. The other ones I kill. Not always, but usually.

The crackling fire illuminates the now dark forest around me.

Ahh, the Panther River, where game grows on trees.

I walk back to my deer, take out my trusted hunting knife, and begin skinning it, as it's too large for me to drag back to my fire. And in any case, the fire is so close by that it's hardly worth it. And if I had made the fire here, in the clearing, then the smoke would definitely have alerted someone that I was nearby. And then some stupid 'Imperial Legioner' would have come to get me and I'd have to kill them.

So I try to steer clear of these weirdos.

The carcass is mostly skinned, and the only parts with fur are the head and paws, and since I don't eat those anyway I cut them off with my knife and begin slicing the buck into sizable chunks.

I wrap these in the skin and bring them to the fire, skewer one on a burned stick, and wait for it to heat up. It will take a while, so I begin an inventory of my current items. A few knives; about two dozen arrows (I'd better come across a bandit archer soon); several large edible nuts whose name I still don't know, but which I call treenuts; one last pair of camouflage patterned clothes; a short sword; two black capes, one of which is mostly in tatters; and a large waterskin. Empty, of course.

I'll need to find a stream, and soon, but for now I think I'll just rest and wait for the meat.

In about an hour, I have two large pieces of venison roasted and ready for eating, and so I begin. They taste like heaven, if heaven tasted like deer meat. Which I bet it doesn't.

Full and rather sleepy, I retire to my small sleeping bag, which I carry around, because sleeping on moldy acorns and wet leaves isn't very enjoyable. I would know.

***

I wake up, feeling more refreshed than usual. No dreams tonight. This comes as a relief - nearly all of my dreams are nightmares, and I always flail about when I sleep, so I usually awake with bruises. This being said, I don't sleep too often.

I pack up my things, smother the fire with the abundant rocks, and stretch. I begin walking, chewing on a wad of the inside of pine bark, which tastes a lot like mint, and continue to contemplate the question that I'm always facing: Where next?

Perhaps I'll just look for a bandit camp and ambush people and settle down for a while. In fact, I decide that's exactly what I'll do; and I head out to a famous one that people somehow always pass and somehow always forget to bring their weapons: Fisherman's rock.

It's about a days journey, and I almost dread having to turn back to the Blackwood, but I persist. It's the perfect camp.

So with my pack full, my stomach settled and my mind made, I hurry on, anxious to find the camp.

This post has been edited by Petra Arkanian: Mar 14 2011, 07:39 PM

[Petra Arkanian]

Okay, so this is basically a flash-back of our protagonist's escape from the Imperial Prison.

CHAPTER 2

The faint but nevertheless hot sun is burning my back under the layers of leather and fur. I take off my old and worn leather jacket and tie it around my waist. My cropped brown hair is hanging down, limp and sweaty, brushing against my neck. I don't understand why it is hot here, as I'm just on a small rocky outcrop that seems to have been forgotten about by the mapmakers. It's nowhere on my old and trusted map, which leads me to believe that I must have gotten turned around somehow.

It's possible, but highly improbable. I have checked and re-checked my unfailable compass, one that I found when I broke out of jail. Stole it from some assassins corpse. That had been a long journey. The memory comes back to me clearly, and I sit down to further marvel over my luck.

I was minding my own hard business, completely immersed in coaxing the hot metal blade to take the proper form, when an old beggar woman came up to me.

"Sir, a coin for the sick?" she wheezed. I turned around to get my money bag, as I was really more of the compassionate type at the time.

My money bag. It had been sitting on a nearby anvil, in a corner of the shop, covered by a cascade of metal-singing scrolls. Both the scrolls and the small satin pouch were gone. GONE!

I turned back to the old woman, only to find that she too, had disappeared. In fact, the only person in my chaotic shop was a man in black that was... that was swinging from the rafters dangling a sword tauntingly above my head!

I swore and jumped, grabbing hold of the low hanging chandelier. The candles cascaded to the floor, some still lit, as I tried to leap to where the thief was clambering down the high wall to avoid the spreading flames.

To avoid the spreading flames!

I pulled down the wall hangings from an old desk - having just bought them and having not gotten around to putting them up - and threw them onto the now raging fire. The sheets only burst into flame, causing the fire to burn only more intensely.

So instead of trying to put the fire out, which I knew was futile, I ran about gathering my most valuable possessions. Not many, as I had just started shop, but enough for me to miss once they were gone.

I grabbed my last singed but unburned book and darted out the door. Those damn thieves!

About half an hour later, one of the employees who worked for Edgar's Discount Spells arrived and put out the remaining flame with some half-working, home-made, unsafe spell that got her doused somehow, even though the jet of luke-warm water had been pointed toward the three other blackened houses. The woman looked flustered as she ducked out of sight to avoid being seen with a wet dress and sopping hair that was dripping onto her shoulders.

"So," said the only present Imperial Guard. "Did you create this burn?"

"No! Of course not! This thief in black came in and stole my purse and I jumped up onto the chandelier and the..." I broke off, the better to get infuriated at the crowd who were shaking their heads incredulously.

"Be at the trial tomorrow. Tomorrow." The Guard turned and, rolling his eyes at the crowd of singed and angry townsfolk, he left back to the Imperial Palace.

Of course, I was much too angry and confused to ask when or where the trail was supposed to be; so the next morning, I was dragged unceremoniously from my lice-infected bed in the Merchants Inn and loaded still half-asleep onto a wagon.

The wagon bumped along for a while, perhaps an hour, and then it stopped with a lurch, and I looked up and saw the Imperial Prisons. My eyes bugged as I thought about how long I'd probably be staying here.

A Guard hauled me out of the none-too-comfortable wagon bed and into an even less comfortable grimy cell. Then the Guard stalked off muttering something about Jerry's pay-raise and bad eggs.

"Hey! Hey, you! Yes, you!" A voice called in a carrying whisper. An ugly Dunmer stepped forward, with rotting-looking skin and a pug nose.

"Well now, a pretty little Wood Elf. You're a little far from the forest, huh? Looks like your days of woodland frolicking have come to a tragic end. To go from the gladed realm of Valenwood to a rat-infested hole like this... how very sad. Those walls must feel like they're closing in on you. Pretty soon you'll go mad, and the Guards will cut your throat just to stop the ranting. That's right. You're going to die in here, Wood Elf! Die!"

I ground my teeth and crawled backward as the man continued; "And if the Guards don't, maybe I will! Just for something to eat, you know? Hehehehehehe."

I was crawling backward now, fast enough to give myself a large lump on my head when I hit the dirty stone wall behind me. It hurt, and I rubbed it furiously and looked down, trying to focus on anything other than the throbbing pain. I stared down in first confusion and then hope.

There was one of those brass rings that you use to haul up trapdoors. I opened it cautiously. There was a small and earthy hole, which went down about five feet, which would mean a bit of a jump at the end and I would still be able to pull myself back up.

I leapt downward, found that I had underestimated the jump a bit, and sank to the floor, nursing my sprained ankle. I looked around in the dark gloom, trying to make out a stick that perhaps I could use to walk with. There was a long bone to my side which I didn't want to use, and then a four-foot metal bar a few feet to my left. I inched toward it and picked it up. It probably only weighed twenty pounds, which wasn't too bad, so I planted it on the dirt and pulled myself up. I found that I could walk if I leaned heavily on my right side and hobbled a bit.

There wasn't much light, not much at all, and it was getting dimmer and dimmer as I walked on down the tunnel. It reminded me a lot of this one story about a Bosmer and this rabbit, which the Bosmer chased and ended up in this huge rabbit hole, where this Altmer ordered the Bosmer's head off. I hoped it wouldn't be too much like that story, because I forgot how it ended and couldn't remember whether or not her head got cut off.

I was so immersed in trying to remember the story that when I walked - smack - into a tunnel-y wall, I stood stunned for a few seconds, wondering what happened. And when I remembered that, I also remembered that there was a spell that could make me get healed.

I raised my hand upward in a fist, uncurled it and said 'Heal!'. Blue light spilled forth from you open palm and I immediately felt much better. I did the gesture again and again until I was satisfied enough to throw the make-shift walking-stick away.

I stretched and continued. It felt good, to be walking without a grimy metal bar in my fist, and I went much more quickly than before. Soon enough I had arrived at a metal barred door, a portcullis, which I pushed open with some hesitation. And for a good reason.

As soon as I stepped through the doorway, I heard screams and shouts which carried through the room, which, I saw, looked suspiciously like Ayleid living hall, but which had obviously been through some hard times. Many columns were cracked or bloodstained, and a few were just stumps, with the remainder cast away on the floor.

"There's another one!" yelled a man with heavy armor. He was brandishing a bloody sword and glaring straight at me. He leapt forward at me and was just about to swing his long sword when I cast a fireball at him. He fell back, dead. A gurgled cry startled me, and another man in the same armor took his place.

"You killed Glenroy!" He cried. "You killed the Emperor!"

I froze, unable to blink. The Emperor! Impossible! Why would the Emperor be down here? Why would he be fighting alongside what I thought to be his guards? And in any case, the Emperor's name was certainty not Glenroy. But that meant... that meant that I was fighting with the side that had killed the Emperor. But wait! The Emperor was dead?!

"No! I didn't! I-" But the man cut me off mid-sentence and stabbed his sword through my thigh. I seemed to be on fire, the pain was so intense. So in retaliation I sent a fireball straight at his chest, which engulfed him in flames.

It took only a second to heal myself before walking past the silken-red clad bodies and to a door which seemed to have light pouring from it. Light!

I opened the door, and stepped into the hazy sunset which barely illuminated the ground. I was free!

This post has been edited by Petra Arkanian: Mar 21 2011, 05:46 PM